UPDATE Oct. 8, 3:40 p.m. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Wednesday that five U.S. airports will screen all travelers from Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, where the Ebola outbreak has hit the hardest.

After passport control, travelers from those countries will be taken to a special area in the airport. CBP staff will observe them for signs of illness, take their temperature, and ask questions related both to their current health and any potential exposure.

If travelers exhibit signs of illness, a CDC quarantine station public health officer will evaluate them and determine if further monitoring is required, at which point they will be referred to the appropriate public health authority. Travelers who do not show any signs of illness will be given a fact sheet explaining what to do if they develop symptoms later.

Screenings at JFK airport in New York, which received more than half of the travelers from the three countries in 2014, will begin Saturday. Screenings at IAD, ORD, ATL and EWR will begin next week.

“We work to continuously increase the safety of Americans,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden. “We believe these new measures will further protect the health of Americans, understanding that nothing we can do will get us to absolute zero risk until we end the Ebola epidemic in West Africa.”

“CBP personnel will continue to observe all travelers entering the United States for general overt signs of illnesses at all U.S. ports of entry and these expanded screening measures will provide an additional layer of protection to help ensure the risk of Ebola in the United States is minimized,” said Jeh Johnson, the secretary of Homeland Security. “CBP, working closely with CDC, will continue to assess the risk of the spread of Ebola into the United States, and take additional measures, as necessary, to protect the American people.”

UPDATE Oct. 8, 12:50 p.m. Temperature screenings will begin this weekend for passengers arriving from West African countries to John F. Kennedy International (JFK) in New York, according to White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest.

Next week screenings will begin at four additional airports, including Newark (EWR) in New Jersey, Washington Dulles (IAD) in D.C., O'Hare (ORD) in Chicago, Illinois, and Hartsfield-Jackson (ATL) in Atlanta, Georgia.

Travelers arriving to the United States will be observed for any signs or symptoms of Ebola, Homeland Security Department officials announced Wednesday. Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas did not elaborate on when new measures would go into effect, but a source told CNN screenings could begin as early as this weekend.

Previously, travelers entering the U.S. from areas hit by the recent Ebola outbreak have received a fact sheet about the disease. The White House has resisted calls from some members of Congress to instate a travel ban; more than 3,400 people in West Africa have died in the outbreak.

Travelers leaving Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are screened as they exit, both by temperature scans and by answering a questionnaire about recent contact with sick individuals. However, Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person to fall ill with Ebola while in the U.S., had also gone through such a screening when he left Liberia.

On Tuesday, the UK announced it would not screen for Ebola at the airport — even if a passenger had just arrived from Liberia.

Temperature screenings at points of entry are not necessarily effective for identifying those sick with the disease. Ebola has a two- to 21-day incubation period, meaning a traveler could show no symptoms until weeks after contracting it. The World Health Organization does not recommend entry screening.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends against all non-essential travel to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

US Airports will begin screening body temperatures of passengers entering the US from #Ebola zone countries, source tells @elizcohencnn

Earlier this week, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said "all options are being looked at" for screening as people enter the U.S. While the procedures for screening passengers leaving Ebola-affected countries are obvious, Fauci said the U.S. is still trying to figure out "what kind of screening you do on the entry end. That's something that's on the table now."

There are no direct flights to the U.S. from Guinea, Sierra Leone or Liberia, so travelers who have been in those countries have gone through other hub airports.

Homeland Security's announcement to observe all travelers arriving to the U.S. with symptoms — not just those from the hardest-hit countries — reflects the potential difficulty of tracking the disease.

The Dallas hospital treating Duncan announced Wednesday morning that he had died. He had gone to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas when he first began exhibiting symptoms, but was sent home with antibiotics on Sept. 25. Three days later, on Sept. 28, he returned to the hospital where he was put in isolation. Duncan was diagnosed with Ebola on Sept. 30.

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